This application claims the priority of Korean Patent Application No. 10-2003-0041979 filed on Jun, 26, 2003, in the Korean Intellectual Property Office, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.
1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to a network device and a method for providing content compatibility between network devices having different respective digital rights management methods. More particularly, the present invention enables network devices having different respective digital rights management methods to transfer and use content between them, by using a security program management module for installing into a specific network device a security program required for using content of other network devices having a security program based on a different digital rights management method through a security program update method.
2. Description of the Related Art
Recently, as digital content becomes more widely distributed, various technologies have been actively developed such that reliable distribution environments capable of efficiently protecting against illegal copying of digital content, allowing transaction parties to use digital content in a lawful manner, and making profit from the use of digital content can be provided or established.
Particularly, digital rights management (DRM) has recently attracted public attention. DRM is a system that protects, manages and distributes digital content, and in a wide sense, is also defined as a technique, procedure, processing and program for managing digital rights, including hardware and software for enabling reliable licensing, secure and safe rights and authentication, and reliable environments and infrastructure.
Among the basic functions of DRM, a security technique has been widely used to protect against the illegal distribution of digital content, which can protect the content owner's rights and also provide consumers with easy and legal availability of digital content.
DRM protects digital content transmitted between network devices within one system or other systems connected thereto. In such a case, only the network device having a specific security program complying with the DRM technique is allowed to receive and use the digital content.
Thus, network devices having different respective DRM-based security programs cannot exchange or use digital content with one another.
FIG. 1 schematically shows a related art network system configuration.
Referring to FIG. 1, there is shown a network device 11 operating on a predetermined network 10. If another network device 12, which uses a DRM-based security program different from that of the network device 11, is connected to the network 10, the newly connected network device 12 is unable to use the digital content or can use only digital content of which security is released, because it uses a security program different from that of the network device 11 operating on the network 10.
That is, even though a specific network device using a different DRM method has been registered into a network service through an authentication process according to networking techniques, DRM characteristics for managing digital content through domain management and encryption make it impossible for the specific network device to communicate with other network devices.
Thus, there is a problem in that content provided from a broadcasting station 30 or a network device 21 operating on a network 20 connected via the Internet 40 cannot be used, and the content of the network device 11 operating on the same network 10 also cannot be used.
Accordingly, there is still a need for a method by which digital content can be exchanged and used between specified network devices, even though security programs using different DRM methods are employed therein.